"Oh for fucks sake!"
Even in her highest moments of temper. Jane had never been someone predisposed to strong language. Especially not in so public a setting. But after everything she had been forced to contend with. Her reserves had finally been exhausted.
By some bean counting bureaucratic tit. Of all things.
"No, damn it! A week's worth of supplies will not be enough! I've been trying to get you people to do more than pay lip service to helping us for almost a week now!"
The Alliance representative stared back at her impassively. Seemingly too apathetic to have any notable reaction to her Outburst. To his credit, he didn't appear to be all that bothered by it. He had probably been on the receiving end of substantially worse than an 18 year old woman cussing at him.
"Look, I wish I could do more."
He said.
"But you aren't the only people who need supplies. I'm sorry."
As Jane rose from her seat intent on launching into an exceptionally more inventive and lengthy series of insults and profanity. Not really caring that she was standing in the middle of a crowded Alliance liaison office. Suddenly a voice sounded behind her.
"Is there a problem here?"
Jane turned around. And saw a man standing nearby. Officer rank, if the uniform and bars were any indication. With a great deal of effort, she reigned in the worst of her temper, and sat up.
"No."
She said,
"I was just leaving."
As she began to walk away, she suddenly felt a firm grip around one bicep. Again she turned, to see the officer fixing her with an intense level of scrutiny. As if searching for something in her features.
"Is there a problem sir?"
Finally, after another few seconds. The officer spoke again. Tone suggesting he had found what he was looking for.
"No problem, crewman."
He said.
"No problem at all."
He let go of Jane's arm, but nonetheless motioned that she follow him.
"Walk with me."
Jane weighed her options. His demeanor didn't suggest detainment was in her immediate future, but a natural distrust of authority figures caused her a moment of suspicious pause. After a moment, she decided that not doing as she had been asked would probably be more trouble than it was worth. She nodded, and fell into step beside the man.
She took note of their route as they walked through the camp. And was rather surprised to see their steps leading toward the communal cafeteria. Which, it had to be said. Was little more than a group of foldout tables and chairs. Set up besides an ad hoc cooking assembly that would have been flattered to be called a soup kitchen.
The Officer procured two bowls of ostensibly edible food. And Jane soon found herself seated across from the dark skinned man. Whose air seemed far more disaffected and casual then she had come to expect from those of his apparent rank and standing.
Tentatively he reached out a hand.
"Lieutenant David Anderson. Alliance Navy. And I take it that you're Jane Shepard?"
Jane felt a bolt of panic shoot through her. What was this? How did he know her name? Anderson seemed to take note of her anxiety and raised a calming hand.
"Relax. You're not in any kind of trouble, truth is I never expected to meet you here. Or anywhere really. I knew your mother quite well you see."
Jane inwardly groaned, far worse than anything she had imagined then. He was no kidnapper or interrogator, he was a fanboy.
"Recognized the resemblance?"
She asked, trying and for the most part succeeding to keep the annoyance out of her voice. Anderson nodded in the affirmative.
"Mhm. Hard to not when they used to put her face on every Navy recruitment holo. The stories I heard about her were a big part of why I enlisted."
"You and every other sailor over the past decade."
Jane thought.
She couldn't blame him of course. Who wouldn't want to follow in the footsteps of the great Admiral Hannah Shepard? The lady of steel, the protector of the Attican traverse. But as far as Jane was concerned, if she died before ever hearing another starry eyed naval crewman on shore leave wax reverential about the great Admiral Shepard, she would consider it a personal victory.
She had no real memories of her. Not really, the woman had died when Jane was barely three for goodness sake.
"So why exactly did you want to talk to me?"
Jane asked. Anderson shifted in his seat, expression pensive.
"I imagine you have a lot on your mind right now. But given your current situation, it seemed…. prudent, to extend you this offer."
Jane raised an eyebrow.
"Offer?"
Anderson coughed into his fist. His discomfort showed more with each passing second.
"Given your family's reputation, and in light of your recent tragedy. The Alliance has authorized me to offer you an exclusive spot in the newest class at the Alliance Officers academy. You'll have a commission and possibly a command waiting for you after graduation. Granted your performance justifies it."
Jane's internal thoughts screeched to halt. Her? Join the alliance? In her experience, the Alliance provided little more than drunken sailors to harass the locals on Mindoir. And very little in the way of actual protection otherwise.
When the Alliance had finally arrived on Mindoir, it had been a day after the fact. To sweep up the worst of the debris and ineffectually "help" the survivors. More than 15,000 men, women, and children had lived on Mindoir.
Less than half of that number remained.
Anderson regarded her in silence. Her expression stormy and discomfited. It had never even crossed her mind to join the Alliance. She admittedly hadn't given a great deal of thought to what path her future would take. She had never been one to focus on the long term, when there was a whole life's worth of living to experience. The only thing she knew with any certainty. Was that she needed Matt to be a part of it.
Howard was missing.
Melanie was dead.
Her Mother was dead.
He was the only thing she had left. She couldn't leave him now. After everything that had happened. Not for anything.
Certainly not for the Alliance.
She stood up.
"I'm sorry Lieutenant."
Anderson recoiled. His expression a few shades short of shocked.
"I- are you sure? Think of what you're giving up here!"
She shook her head.
"Nothing compared to what I'd be leaving behind sir. Have a good day."
She turned to walk away. Before she was more than a dozen steps away however. She heard his voice again.
"Wait a moment."
He said. He was standing behind. Hand outstretched. A small holocard held within.
"Take this. Please."
She looked down at it. Expression dubious.
"What's that, exactly?"
Anderson seemed to hesitate.
"My contact information. If your heart's set then I won't force the issue. But if you need help. Or if you just need to talk-"
He trailed off. She looked at the proffered card. Expression unreadable, before slowly reaching out a hand and taking hold of it, pocketing it.
"Thank you, Lieutenant."
She said, before turning around and stalking back miserably to the habitation block of the camp.
Anderson watched the girl leave. Internally grimacing. It had felt awkward to give the girl his information like that. But he'd never been able to turn away a chance to be of help to others.
He didn't know if he'd ever hear from her again. It had probably been an empty gesture, but it had felt like the right thing to do, all the same.
He stepped away from the mess and through the press of bodies. Making room with a smart shoulder, where his bars didn't get the attention he needed. It was a five minute walk through the bustle of refugees and aid workers before he finally reached the inner gate.
He only barely gave thought to the crisp salute the gate guards gave him. Only just remembering to return it, before stepping through into the ops center. Which even now was a frenzied hive of activity.
Procuring enough food, medicine, bedding, and other essentials for 7,000 refugees. Even with the help of 22nd century logistics, was proving to be a nightmare. Logistical as well as literal. And then there was the damn colony to consider.
Anderson glared at the pillars of smoke rising from the colony roughly ten miles distant. Fires still evidently burning two weeks after the fact. He clenched his fists as he stared out over the plains.
If they had managed to reactivate the relay just a day sooner, if he had just been a little better at his job….
He shook his head.
No point in wondering about ifs. He had plenty to think about already. He waded through the swarm of clerks and paper pushers until he finally reached his desk. Or rather, the stack of small storage containers that he was currently using as his desk.
He settled heavily into the folding chair and pulled his holo-top towards him. Inputting his credentials with the robotic precision of long memorisation. The home screen flashed in front of him and he looked over his current workload.
Predictably the requisitions and complaints folders were well and truly gravid with reports he would inevitably have to suffer his way through. But for now he could put it aside. There was still the report on the Shepard girl to make. He sent the contact request. And waited in silence as the call pinged off the local comm buoy. After a few moments the call was answered.
Anderson recoiled suddenly. Discipline briefly forgotten. The person on the other end looked up at him. A single eyebrow raised.
"Is there a problem lieutenant?"
Rear Admiral of the navy Akamu Kahoku asked, pointedly.
Anderson snapped off a hasty salute.
"Of course not sir."
He said hastily.
"You just aren't who I expected to see."
Kahoku nodded.
"Understandable, now Lieutenant. Report if you please."
Anderson cleared his throat.
"Of course sir, as ordered I made contact with Jane Shepard. And presented her with the Alliance's scholarship offer."
Kahoku nodded.
"Very good. Very good. I expect she'll be on the next shuttle to Arcturus then."
Anderson made a short uncomfortable noise.
"Er, no sir. I can't say she will."
Kohaku's eyes snapped up.
"And why the hell not man?!"
Anderson was briefly taken aback by the Admiral's sudden shift of temper. But marshaled himself to answer.
"She….said no, sir."
Kahoku looked at him blankly.
"She said no."
"Yes sir."
Kahoku rubbed the bridge of his nose.
"She was offered a choice spot at one of the most prestigious military academies in alliance space, and she said….no?"
"I'm afraid so sir."
Kahoku sighed.
"She wasn't drunk was she?"
Anderson responded. Vaguely confused.
"No sir-?"
"She hadn't just been hit on the head or anything like that?"
"Not that I could tell sir."
Kahoku massaged his temples wearily.
"Thank you for your report lieutenant. I'm certain you have a great deal to work through right now. Good day."
If the Admiral heard Anderson's return farewell. He gave no sign. And the connection terminated with a warbling beep.
Anderson slumped back in his chair and exhaled explosively.
What exactly had an admiral been doing involved with something like this? Surely one girl didn't warrant that level of attention?
"Lieutenant!"
He looked up. One of the clerks was rushing toward him.
"Sir there's a few things that need signing sir. It shouldn't take long."
Anderson looked with trepidation at the armful of datapads the Clerk was carrying.
He wondered, briefly. If rubbing the fine members of the Alliance logistical corps collective noses in the dictionary definition of the word "few". Would make them start using it correctly. After a moment, he decided that the answer was a resounding "probably not".
He sighed and stood up.
No rest for the wicked then.
Arcturus station had been built as the military headquarters of the Alliance. It was the seat of the parliament. And the Admiralty board.
When decisions that affected the course of the Alliance's future were made. They were made in rooms in Arcturus, rooms like the one that Rear Admiral of the Navy Akamu Kahoku was entering.
He swept into the room. Door sliding shut behind him and moving into place until the seamline was only barely visible. The lighting was dimmed, and the room soundproofed. And almost every one of its occupants had alibi's and witnesses that would swear up and down that they were elsewhere.
"You're late."
A voice said. Haughty, middle aged and female.
Kahoku scoffed.
"I had business elsewhere."
She waved a hand and motioned that he sit.
"Irrelevant, The Shepard girl. When can we expect her?"
Kahoku coughed uncomfortably into a closed fist. Gaze averted.
"We…. won't."
The room. Which had already been quiet when he entered. Become as silent as the grave.
"Is that so?"
She said, tone at least betraying nothing of her mood. Another voice, male, this time. Chose that moment to interject.
"That's hardly the end of things. The stick can answer just as well as the carrot. It's only a matter of finding something to adequately incentivize…. compliance."
She shook her head.
"No, If she is to come, she must do so of her own free will. Or at least what she thinks is her own free will. Holding her with blackmail or threats will only serve to Alienate her."
The last living daughter of Hannah Shepard had been a subject of much discussion among the assembled individuals. After Hannah's death the majority of the Shepard family, including her two daughters, one of them newborn at the time. Had scattered to the four winds.
"However we acquire her, she must be acquired. Hannah's first daughter bucked our yoke. And robbed us of any chance to influence her second. But this Jane is too valuable of an asset to lose."
And oh what an asset.
Hannah Shepard even seventeen years after her death. Was perhaps one of the Alliance's greatest heroes, her death had been both a tragedy and a windfall for the Alliance. Her martyrdom in the eyes of the populace had allowed the Alliance to ride a wave of propaganda and public support. Hundreds of thousands had enlisted in the months after her death alone.
But that wave, like all. Had crested, and Admiral Shepard's potency as a symbol had waned. As human space expanded ever outward, new hands were needed to reach for rifles and man ships. But there were fewer new hands every year.
Unsustainably less.
They needed a new Symbol. A new face to plaster on the propaganda vids. And who better than the young patriotic daughter of one of the Alliance's greatest heroes?
"And what of the other?"
A new voice asked. Male and the youngest sounding so far.
"Other?"
There were a silent few moments as he tapped commands into an unseen tablet. Before a new face appeared on all their screens.
The boy in the picture was around sixteen or seventeen when it had been taken. Jet black hair and pale skin. Prominent features. And very strange eyes.
Very strange indeed.
"Matthew Price."
That raised the eyebrows of almost everyone in the room. That name had not been spoken among them
In some time.
"It was to my understanding that they had…. flown the coop so to speak. The Prices are more scattered than the Shepards if I recall correctly."
The first, older male voice responded.
"True. Most of them are beyond our influence. And most of the ones we know about won't have anything to do with the Alliance."
The first female seemed to take a moment's thoughtful silence.
"Could he be acquired?If he's anything like his father. He would be a valuable tool. If not quite as useful as the Shepard girl."
"Possibly. But by most accounts he was rendered missing or dead in the same attack that brought the Shepard girl to our attention."
Kahoku chose that moment to interject.
"And his father? I seem to remember he was quite an asset in his day. If he could be brought back into the fold-."
"I wouldn't count on it."
The first female interrupted.
"He did not part with the Alliance on the best of terms. I doubt he would be willing to treat with us, and he knows enough about a few of us to put us all collectively in some rather hot water if we tried to resort to threats. And that's assuming the man's alive anyway."
The second male voice spoke up.
"Well, in any case. We at least know where Shepard's daughters disappeared to. I always suspected they had hidden somewhere in the colonies. It was finding them that was the issue. We can at least be certain to keep tabs on the girl now that we have her."
"Knowing her whereabouts is one thing. Having her is another."
Kahoku responded.
"Until we can find some way to bring her into the fold. She's an unknown, and one that might be used against us."
The first female nodded her agreement.
"Your point is made. But her initial refusal is a difficult hurdle to overcome. As I said, blackmail or threats are out of the question. It would leave her loyalty to the Alliance little more then a house built on sand. She needs to come to us."
Kahoku leaned back in his chair. Hands clasped together.
"Then I suppose we have some work to do."
Jane had been among the first to volunteer to go back into the ruins.
Ostensibly, she was there for the same reason everyone else was. To look for supplies and survivors. But everyone there knew what her true goal was.
Even two weeks later. Howard and Matthew remained unaccounted for. And no amount of searching in any part of the settlement had yielded results. But Jane still held out hope, it wasn't as if they had searched everywhere yet. And Howard and Matthew were both born survivors, they were probably camping some distance from the settlement. Even now wondering where she was. And why she hadn't found them yet.
Yes. That was it.
She had heard little of what had transpired after Howard had sent her away. And seen even less, but what she'd seen gave her reason to hope. He really had been giving the bastards hell.
Jane shook her head. Looking wearily at the paltry collection of supplies and personal effects they had found so far. They came back with less each trip. And before too long she suspected they would stop sending them at all. What would be the point?
As the party drew closer to the transport hub. Jane couldn't hide an improvement in her mood. If there was a trail. She'd find it there.
"Holy-!"
Jane spun to look at the frontmost guard as they traipsed into the ruins of the Transport hub. In his defense. The reaction was entirely understandable. There were bodies. And pieces of bodies, everywhere. Some blasted, some shot. All very, very dead.
"So this is what Howard was capable of."
She carefully stepped over the corpses. There was blood everywhere. But she had no way of knowing whose blood it was.
The group spread out. Either hiding their reactions to the tableau of rent limbs and broken inert bodies. Or perhaps now too used to the sight of corpses to be affected much by it.
Jane tried her best to retrace Howards steps. The day's old scene giving her a wealth of clues to draw together a patchwork of events. Briefly at times filling the gaps with her own recollection of events.
She stood approximately where she remembered he started. She took note of footprints left barely readable in the dust. Ending in a long dragging line. Ending behind a flipped table.
"He runs behind this table. Slides the last few feet. Hiding or preparing? Probably both."
She glanced at the area beyond the table. Eyes taking everything in. And noted the rent casing of a spent flashbang. Before heaving herself over the table.
"He throws a flashbang. Which disorients these poor bastards."
She studied the remains. Heart and headshots. Clean, methodical, precise.
Some distance away, she noted a blasted area of ground. The work of a grenade if she was any judge. Covered in corpses in various stages of dismemberment, though the variety of bits and pieces made it impossible to ascertain exactly how many it had killed.
"After he's done with them, the rest get their act together. They spray in his direction. Looks like they miss."
An enormous patch of bullet holes and chipped duracrete. Where he would've been standing a few moments before.
His footprints lead into a jump that leaves marks of a landing behind a nearby pillar.
"They can't adjust their fire in time. He uses the cover to get 5 more."
He'd vaulted over the pillar after that from what she could tell. A short distance away she could see six bodies that looked to have been put through a meat grinder. Clearly the work of an exceptionally powerful shotgun. Though where'd he'd gotten it, or where it was now. She couldn't say.
"Most of them are dead by now. He takes cover and chucks a last grenade in-"
She looked in the direction of a second area of blasted ground. Again covered in severed limbs and rent corpses.
"-that direction."
She took note of a set of bootprints leaving the cover he'd taken. Ending suddenly, and terminally in two dark faded bloodstains.
Jane took a shaky breath. It was a confirmation of what she had already all but known. But to know beyond a doubt, was still a blow. She wondered Idly why the bastards hadn't at least had the decency to leave the body where it lay. Give her something, anything. To bury, to say goodbye to.
As it was, the Casket next to Mel's would be empty.
She turned to leave. Sick to her heart of the place. When her eyes took in one last horrid detail.
"No."
She thought.
"God no."
She walked to where it lay. Kneeled down, and took it in her hands.
Matthew's jacket. Covered in dried blood.
She had bought it for him, before the relay had gone dark. A gift for his eighteenth birthday. And since then the only time she had seen him out of it was if he needed to sleep or wash it.
He had come back, that much was clear. Maybe just in time to watch Howard die. And then-?
She clutched at the ragged garment, clinging to it like a lifeline. No tears fell, not anymore. There was just a cold empty numbness. A hole where her family used to be.
She stood. Barely cognizant of the world around her. When the others had finished their own searches, and it came time to leave, she did so without so much as a glance, or a second thought.
There was nothing for her here.